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Ars Technica Reviews Mozilla
Aglassis writes "This Ars Technica review gives mozilla 1.0 an overall score of 7/10 (9 for Gecko and 6 for the browser). The major detractor was the user interface, since it didn't feel like a Windows application. This was probably due to a poor understanding by the authors of XUL. Overall they say that mozilla would make a good substitute for IE 6 but there is no major reason to switch over."
I like the tab feature with Galeon, Mozilla, and opera. That is one large feature they have over IE.
Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
Poor understandnig of XUL or not, if it doesn't feel like a Windows application, then it just *doesnt* feel like a Windows application. I agree with the author's opinion on that. I am a happy mozilla user at home on my Linux box, but I am not about to switch IE to Mozilla on my windows machine here at work, theres really no reason aside from maybe curtailing javascript annoyances (popups, resizes, etc)
siri
...but there is no major reason to switch over.
Secirity Problems perhaps? Given the number os severe security issues that have been found in IE over the years, I would have thought this would have been a pretty major reason to switch!
Disclaimer: I meant what I thought, not what I wrote! What? You can't read my Mind? Oh dear!
The major detractor was the user interface, since it didn't feel like a Windows application
Well, can I be the first to say, "Thank God"?
I mean, isn't this a Good Thing (TM), at least according to Thomas Krul's theory?
Never confuse volume with power.
Unless you are a web designer who wants to make sure that his site looks correctly when viewed with a browser that adheres to STANDARDS, or unless you are a person who believes that the web should be easy to navigate and not overwhelmed with pop-up advertisements, or unless you believe that you should have the ability to modify the code to your browser for timely fixes to security flaws. Nope, no major reasons there....
I'd say there's several major reasons to switch.. the fact that you can block pop up advertising is a major reason. The fact that is has far superior cookie and password management is a major reason. The fact that it has a better email and usenet client (than OE) is a major reason.
No major reasons? According to who, Billy?
The major detractor was the user interface, since it didn't feel like a Windows application. This was probably due to a poor understanding by the authors of XUL.
You're joking, right? XUL is an interface/component application based on XML allright. But that has nothing to with the cited usability problems. The Open Source community simply has to stop saying things like 'yeah the user interface is bad, but if you complain about it openly it shows that you don't really understand the XYZWhatever+ architecture!' Stop accepting things like they are, change the world (of software) now!
Mozilla 1.0 is 'getting there'.
Support for flash / shockwave is decent.
Frontpage-generated pages still distort often.
Java works great (better than IE).
At leasts it beats opera on stability and functionality, plus it's (banner)free.
With Linux, I guess it's your best choice, with Windows, frontpage makes the difference, not IE.
This was probably due to a poor understanding by the authors of XUL Why is it a poor understanding for the reviewers ? This is one of the reasons that techies have a bad name the "I know best" attitude that pervades our industry. I like Mozilla, I use Mozilla, I like it because it works and because of the way its navigation works. BUT if you are used to Windows and not an old school Unix person then it is different to the rest of the windows applications you use so it is a valid comment. Now its not difficult to fix by having the Windows Theme be one of the default installed themes so Mozilla looks the same as the rest of Windows. Get off your high horse and think about why looking like everything else is good for the majority of users who don't want the power and control that Gecko and Mozilla offer, they just want a Browser that looks like the other applications they use. Minimise the "suprise" factor and maximise the uptake.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
XUL has nothing to do with it.
They like the engine. It's the default interface that 99% of users will be using that they have problems with, and I think that's a valid point.
XUL makes it possible to do a lot of cool interface things, and it is definitely a Good Thing For Mozilla, but it doesn't really matter when the default interface is slow and sucks.
Heck, most people never even change their startup page, much less program a new *interface*
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
Promoting Frontpage as an advantage is similar to saying that Volkswagen would never sell in East Germany because they have the Trabant.
Frontpage is to web design what chocolate is to teapots.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
They say the interface was unflexible, non-standard, and yes, didn't look like the native interface.
At the very least you must concede that the interface IS non-standard and does NOT look like the native interface.
So, we conclude that:
> This was probably due to a poor understanding
> by the authors of XUL.
Explain?!?
They make a valid point. It's true regardless of the technologies involved. So you claim that they are wrong due to ignorance of XUL? I would claim that you were wrong due to ignorance of logic.
Justin Dubs
1.) Tabbed Browsing
2.) No more popups
3.) Better Security
Reasons to still use IE on occasion:
1.) Poor support for common technologies (like the JRE: it runs but it don't run for long (2-3 hours and it goes down hard)).
2.) Poor support for common but non-standard features (Like layers). Even Qmailadmin doesn't work well with Mozilla.
3.) Idiot web designers that refuse to let you view their page/application unless you have one of their approved browsers (Like Webtrends).
My $0.02 will always be worth more than your â0.02, so
Using a browser other than IE is voting for an open, interoperable internet.
The worst problem with the current internet landscape is the proliferation of "table-based" layouts.
But what does view source reveal?
<!-- CONTENT TABLE --><TABLE WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLSPACING="0" CELLPADDING="0">
<TR>
Look no further than the HTML header for the culprit:
<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 5.0"><meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document">
Now that they have recognized the problem, are they or their resident Microsoft weenie going to fix it? Probably not.
One of the negative points was that Mozilla does not look like a Windows app. I shall ignore the existence of the IE skin for now.
However, what I will mention is software such as QuickTime player, RealOne, MusicMatch Jukebox, and literally anything written in Java. None of these use the MFC toolkit (not the widgets, anyway) nor do they follow the theme of the widgets in WinXP.
Many people complain that Linux apps don't fit together because QT != GTK != Motif etc. However, it is commonplace in Windows apps for larger development outfits to use their own widget sets, and nobody bats an eyelid.
As a simple example, I use Mozilla with the excellent Orbit-Retro theme. My dad can't figure it out. So, I switch to the IE theme. The layout is identical, but the look/feel of the widgets is more 'windows like'. Suddenly he's right at home.
Perhaps the comment should have read 'doesn't look like any of the windows apps we're used to'
The fact that it has a better email and usenet client (than OE) is a major reason.
You have to be joking. I'm a Mozilla advocate, but even I admit the mail client is a piece of trash.
The interface is inconsistent, and it doesn't make it obvious what is going on at any one time. There's nothing like the big 'Send/Recv' button in OE, and when you collect mail, you have no idea what's going on.
The folders are sloppily managed, and the news reader is certainly worse.
Sure, it doesn't automatically open attachments or spread viruses around.. but the user experience is more important than security to me! It's a program I have to use for hours every day!
mogorific carpentry experiments
Try going into Tools -> Internet Options -> Advanced -> (Uncheck) Reuse windows for launching shortcuts
I believe the problem you are having is with IE's handling of shortcuts to URLs, which is all that Favorates actually are. If you have this option checked and hit a favorate, it will open the favorate in the last used window. This often turns out to be the first one you opened.
A true critique of user interfaces uses testing methodologies involving actual users. I don't know if the Mozilla critics actually did any testing, but UI and usability testing is a science, not a matter of personal preferences.
It can be measured scientifically.
I use Mozilla myself, and I try to get others to use Mozilla. I think it's great, and can only get better.
However, you and others are right in pointing out that a barrier to entry is the fact that the program doesn't follow the "standard" Windows user interface. When it's not what people are used to, they can't immediately begin using it; it doesn't "feel" as much as if it were "part of the system".
Still, the solution you propose of using the Windows XUL theme would, I believe, only make things worse. How? Because then, the browser would still only have most of the appearance of a "normal" Windows application (it still looks a little different), and it still wouldn't act the same. For example, the little "grab" area on the very left side of the toolbars don't work the same way. Having the interface look mostly the same as other apps, but function differently, would only confused people more.
Besides, the real question should be whether having the browser interface be "non-standard" is a significant barrier to using the application, not just whether it is different. And while I think the Mozilla 1.0 default interface is worse than it could be, I don't think it's too significant a difference. Other applications have very different interfaces, yet they are learned. For example, WinAmp is one of the most popular and widely used digital audio players, yet its interface is very different from the standard Windows interface. In fact, Winamp alone is probably the reason Microsoft made Windows Media Player skinnable.
Granted, people learned Winamp because, for a time, it was the only MP3 player available, or significantly better than other offerings, so the entry barrier of having to learn a new interface was less important. So perhaps the UI difference is more significant for Mozilla since Mozilla's features aren't too far advanced over those of Internet Explorer (on the surface, anyway, as far as the average user would think). So, because it presents fewer other reasons to switch, the different UI becomes more significant as a reason not to switch.
The solution, I think, is not to changed the default Mozilla UI to a Windows-like one, which would confuse things even more, but instead to create something "similar, but different" - something closer to the default Windows interface, but obviously different so people wouldn't expect it to behave exactly the same. I would nominate Lo-Fi, because it takes on the Windows UI colors, and it's simple and to-the-point in its working, but it still isn't quite right. Beginners should still have text labels on all the toolbar buttons, and the Lo-Fi icons in Mozilla Mail are a little abstract and confusing.
Unfortunately, I don't think any of the currently available XUL themes for Mozilla are good for people new to Mozilla, especially people who are used to Internet Explorer and the standard Windows UI.
When AbiSource built their word processor, they did most of it cross-platform. You can look, and see that the majority of the source is in the 'xp' directores. But there's a lot of platform-specific code, too. Even though AbiWord is written with a cross-platform GUI layer, when you actually compile AbiWord, it converts the cross-platform widgets into native widgets. Therefore, you can run AbiWord on Windows, GTK, even BeOS, and it will use *native* widgets. Not emulated widgets, native ones. It looks like the platform you're using, because it is.
I understand that the Moz guys want cross-platformability. But XUL is bloated and slow. The Moz team should know full well that the only reason anyone uses Galeon, or KMeleon, is because Moz is too slow! So why can't they follow the Abi example, and have XUL widgets convert to native at compile-time? They can still use XUL for unsupported platforms, but have native GTK or Win32 widgets for the two most common.
The Mozilla team made a great browser, really. But I think it's fair to say, probably a good half of their prospective users, if not more, would use it except for XUL. They should do something about it.
The major detractor was the user interface, since it didn't feel like a Windows application. This was probably due to a poor understanding by the authors of XUL.
Oh yeah, his observations are invalid because he doesn't know about XUL. You know what? Not many people know or care about XUL. What they want is a browser that looks consistent with the rest of their applications on their particular OS. Your comment is invalid.
Actually fonts in Mozilla 1.1b on OSX 10.1.5 or greater look great. I agree with everything else you say though. It doesn't matter if M$ have achieved their advantage in an "unfair" way. The average person doesn't care. In fact I've spoken to many people who are actively looking forward to the day when Mozilla dies so they only have to worry about designing their pages for IE.
I use Mozilla on OS X for lots of reasons, but I have never understood why it has to be a single monolithic app. Why should I load up the e-mail client when I want to use the browser (or vice versa).
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
Real simple: The mail client. I've got three e-mail accounts (personal, mailing list and business) that I need to juggle and I just don't have the time to figure out how I'd go about it in OE. In Mozilla I add the incoming servers and log-in names and I'm done.
On top of that, my business e-mail account all but requires me to use mail filters to manage incoming mail, and after having used OE's filters exetensively I'd have to say that Mozilla's are easier to configure and manage. It's the little touches like being able to create a new folder in the filter editor that's really nice. And when you delete the folder in question, Mozilla gives me the option of automatically deleting the related filters as well (something OE doesn't do).
Oh, and I find myself hitting Ctrl+T in IE all the time whenever I have to use it. I've been so pampered by tabs it's not even funny.
- Tabbed Browsing. Don't know how I lived without it.
- Fine grained cookie blocking/control
- Image (read ad) blocking
- Free as in beer and speech
- Cross platform. Some folks use more than Windows ya know?
- Popup blocking. 'Nuff said.
- Skinnable. Don't like the look? Change it.
- Security. Lack of integration with other MS products is a good thing.
- Fast. In my experience Mozilla (Gecko) is faster than IE most of the time on Windows. And rarely is is slower. Plus did I mention it's cross-platform?
And that's just off the top of my head. While any one might not be enough all of them together are pretty compelling.I thought the review wasn't especially well done and there was some functionality the reviewer obviously didn't explore thoroughly. (tabbed browsing comes to mind) I can't for the life of me figure out what he means by IE being more "polished". He rightly points out that installing plugins is more of a pain than it should be but most of the rest of navigator is no worse than IE from a "polish" standpoint. Not that I can see anyway. I suppose there is some wiggle room for personal preferences but the differences aren't huge.
To paraphrase Richard Stallman: Why can't we talk about freedom? Why don't any of these reviews make any effort to explain mozilla's licensing and why users should care about it? (Mozilla has a license that allows multiple companies to make competing implementations, and that gives users rights instead of making draconian restrictions. This is an important different that ordinary users can appreciate.)
I can understand why reviewers would feel they should mainly focus on features and the user interface. But to overlook these huge licensing issues completely, to not factor them into the final rating at all, is to ignore a huge glaring difference between mozilla and the competition.
--Bruce F.
1. Extremely Slow on extremely large sites, unresponsive (looks like program hangs) (large tables, source code, large amount thumbnails)
2. One busy tab can hang Mozilla.
3. Image place holders should allow you to scroll a page while its loading. Scroll bar freezes.
4. Spell Checker crashes. (to be fair, its a beta spellchecker)
5. Crashs on multiple tabs loading.
6. Little Bloated, Would like things seperated, Mozilla browser crashs, email crashs with it, downloads crash.
7. Personal bar doesnt wrap, should have a drop down menu at the end. (imho)
8. Downloading, Mozilla copies the file, after it downloads, and hangs until copied.. (not to mention if it crashs, you loose your download,very annoying, might switch to a download program to bypass problem) Why cant it just save to the directory you select? Why copy, and need 2x the space...
They fixed the context menus on the personal bar when I submitted a bug report, All I can is WOW. These guys are on the ball about fixing it. But I see a trend to blame the website authors and mark bugs as "Evangelism" or "WontFix", or push off till next year. I do believe thou, some of the developers are off on a break, so thats why the push off till next year.
Remember, I am not a developer. I just read the news, report and follow the bug reports. I truely like Mozilla, themes, tabs, email/news client that is very nice. I would consider my self as a poweruser, I do tend to push mozilla harder than the average folks.
-
Do you use DirectVNC?
"One of the beautiful things about open-source products such as this, though,
.. Why should the web browser pretend
.. we all know its not "Windows XP's". 2nd.. How in the world can you prefer the taskbar grouping
..period. Is that not control?
.. etc .. etc ...
is that you can freely modify the source code and make your own build of the software to
suit your specific needs. While many Ars readers do this, the average power-user will not,
so we will skip over the build process and focus on the pre-compiled program itself."
Right off the bat you know he's just saying this out of courtesy, to say that he mentioned
one of the strenghts of OSS, and not get flamed.
In the other hand..Hopefully he undertands that being able to look at the code
and modify it to suit your needs is not the only benefit of an OSS project like this.
"Mozilla could have handled many of these problems in much the same way Opera does:
by spoofing the browser identity string to impersonate another browser.
This functionality isn't present in Mozilla, even though it would solve many of the incompatibilities between
Mozilla and the rest of the internet."
You mean incompatiblities between lazy web designers and the web standards?
to be something else and bend the standards and allow those designers to continue with the non-compliant code?
"I much prefer Windows XP's taskbar grouping, but many people see tabbed browsing as a godsend."
Ok, first of all
over tabbed browsing? Tabbed browsing is way more efficient than having to move you mouse all the way to the bottom
, click and wait for the task list to show up, and then remember which was the window you wanted.
"Unfortunately, you cannot tell it to open all new windows in new tabs, regardless of how they are generated,
so you will end up with more than one Navigator window on your screen from time to time."
CTRL + click !
"A good UI is functional, adaptable and transparent. Navigator is reasonably functional,
completely inflexible, and sticks out like a sore thumb."
reasonably functional - eh... way more functional than your normal browser out there.
completely inflexible - hmm, no?
sticks out like a sore thumb - this is actually arguable. Although I have become acustomed to the interface, I wish it was faster.
"Most of Navigator's looks are defined with "skins" and skin developers have quite a bit of control
over how the browser looks."
You are contradicting yourself! see previous point.
"Much like IE, however, it will remember per-session cookies even after you leave a page.
It will hold that cookie until you close that particular browser window.
If you often use a site that uses such cookies, make sure you log out of it - Navigator will not do it for you."
Out of curiousity.. What browser deletes a cookie when you leave a site? Most cookies used for one time log-in purposes
on websites will stay for the duration of the browsing session or until they expire. Why would the browser delete it!?
"Some users may like the skinning features, and be fine with having limited control over
where browser elements are placed and what they look like."
If you don't like a skin, dont use it
"There is no feature compelling enough to prompt a switch from IE 6, aside from personal taste"
Personal taste? hahahah
- IE has 100 times more security holes
- pop-ups blocking
- tabbed browsing
- Web standards compliant (Gecko)
- Awsome community support
- Very useful plug-ins support: ie: Mouse Gestures
- Mozilla actually prints pages on paper better than IE.
- etc
I switched long ago, and not only because of personal taste! plzzz
Although he makes some valuable points, you could tell right from the start, he was always defending IE. Now, thats personal taste(interest?)
[alk]
[...] but there is no major reason to switch over.
Ha! Here are 8 reasons to start with. 16 more if you're using IE 5.5.
hey, now
what about kmeleon?
it may not have had an update since last october, and I may never have tried it, but it's gecko with native windows widgets and even designed to look and act like IE.
I am sure that they could use some help...
That kind of project (though perhaps with some more attentive/dedicated people behind it) is the one we need to have a stronger opponent to IE. And no, Opera just doesn't cut it for mainstream audiences; banners==bad
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
Stop accepting things like they are, change the world (of software) now!
Can you be a little more specific? How wold you like your browser to look and act, besides like IE? The "cited usability problems" were that the thing did not act like IE. Here's what some constructive criticism looks like:
IE user interface problems noted under win2k:
"Favorites" can't have characters in their names that mess with old DOS conventions.
ftp, http, local files are remembered and treated sepearatly. This artificial division makes swithching between the different "zones" difficult to do and makes the history file much less useful.
User settings are poorly organized vary from version to version. Typically kept under multiple menue items and burried in a forrest of tabs in nonsensical dialogs, IE's user settings are both harder to find and less empowering when located.
Abomnible on off control of scripting, no image control. Adverts are impossible to turn off.
Fav icon suffers from typical M$ bugs. Often loads wrong image, takes forever to display. Gives user information away without asking.
ftp site browsing sucks. The psuedo Apple triangle file tree browsing is much much better than IE's stupid attempt to make ftp sites look like local folders. Confusion is not integration, Micro$oft. ftp site non response locks up entire interface. Talk about pathetic.
Those are some things off the top of my head. I rarely use IE at work, but sometimes I have to. When I do, I notice that kind of crap. If all of these problems were to be fixed, you would have something much closer to Mozilla. That's what the open source folks did - they changed the software they had available and made some new stuff bassed on user wants and best practices. This was done while M$ was bussy catching up to Netscape 4, and adding new hooks to their other software that no one wanted, and works wretchedly today. What kind of input do you think M$ got for IE? It took advice from content pushers and advert makers. Pthththt!
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.